This page holds the match reports for all games completed so far this season. It is my intention to post at least a summary report for each game, at the same time as the result for the game, with full reports becoming available as and when those designated for the task turn in their copy. The current report will always be available in the latest section of the results page but will also be available here.

The links below provide a direct route to the report for each game plus access to the reports for seasons from 2000 to the present. It is also possible to link to them from the associated rolling results page entries and I hope to extend that facility to include all of the historical results pages, once I’ve figured out the best method of doing so.

• 26 Apr 2009: Beechwood (A)
• 3 May 2009: Broadbridge Heath (A)
• 10 May 2009: Sutton (A)
• 24 May 2009: Dormansland (A)
• 30 May 2009: Leigh (A)
• 7 Jun 2009: Woldingham Village (A)
• 21 Jun 2009: Tadworth (A)

• Match reports for season 2008
• Match reports for season 2007
• Match reports for season 2006
• Match reports for season 2005
• Match reports for season 2004
• Match reports for season 2003
• Match reports for season 2002
• Match reports for season 2001
• Match reports for season 2000

Unless otherwise noted both summary and full match reports are written by your host and webmaster, Steve Pitts, as are all editorial comments and statistical notes. For reasons that are now lost in the mists of time, the reports are laid out in reverse chronological order, but hopefully the links above make that an unimportant detail.

View the scorecard of this game

[It seems that nobody is interested in writing full match reports because they consider my summaries to be detailed enough to be sufficient, and whilst it remains my intention to post a one or two paragraph summary of each game when I enter the scorecard data, I am struggling to find the time to do even that at the moment]

Summary: Whilst the Badgers were definitely on the receiving end in this game, on another warm and sunny day that brought extra spectators out of the woodwork, the game ended on a high note for the visitors after an afternoon of toil. The home side put the Badgers’ bowling to the sword, with only opener Allan and first change Greggy escaping the onslaught. Bellinger did most of the damage from the number five slot, finishing unbeaten on 102, but opener Ireland (49) kept things moving early on. Allan tightened his grip on the slip position with another good catch and also took a steepler at mid off but the visitors regretted spilling their only opportunity to remove Bellinger, a difficult chance to deep mid on.

Another poor batting performance followed, with only Pat (43) showing the necessary application before sagging under the weight of carrying the whole team on his shoulders, yet again. When three wickets fell with the score on 117 and more than twelve overs left it looked like the Badgers were on their way to another drubbing but numbers ten and eleven had other ideas with Darrell hitting his first two balls for four and Chris Byrne also finding the boundary on more than one occasion. The pair held out for the whole of the remaining time and came within a whisker of breaking a record in the process.

Statistical Notes: The tenth wicket partnership between Darrell and Chris Byrne was just two runs shy of the record for that wicket, and is the second best ever. In both cases it was their highest score for the club, and Darrell tied his lifetime personal best in any form of cricket (which may help to explain why he was still trying to score off the last ball of the game, a factor that seemed to go down well with the opposition skipper, who commented in the bar after the game that we did not shut up shop and play for the draw).

View the scorecard of this game

[It seems that nobody is interested in writing full match reports because they consider my summaries to be detailed enough to be sufficient, so this is almost certainly going to have to do]

Summary: Darrell and I set off for this game more in hope than expectation, with heavy rain having fallen overnight and storm clouds all around, but in the end we managed an uninterrupted contest the latter half of which was played in glorious sunshine. The weather spiced the pitch up a little and Mark opened with himself and Darrell which if nothing else provided the batsmen with opposite ends of the pace spectrum. Both of them bowled very tidily, to the extent that the skipper never saw fit to change the bowling, and whilst a number of Woldingham batsmen got starts (over half of them reached double figures) only opener Wymer (53) showed the necessary patience. The fielding was much improved, with Paul Little’s diving effort in the gully the one that siicks in my mind, if nothing else for the look on his face. It looked like Woldingham might post another 200 plus score but in their urgency to push the score along they subsided from 103 for 3 to 142 all out with Mark and Graham Ward snaring a couple of catches apiece (to keep the catching cup interesting) and Steve pouching a catch standing up and three stumpings.

Despite having seen the trouble that Darrell caused by taking the pace off the ball on a pitch where the odd delivery misbehaved Woldingham chose to open with two medium pacers (and apparently had chosen their bowling order in advance) and they didn’t seem to work out that the short ball was not a good option, thus giving Steve the scope to unleash the usual array of pull shots and pepper the garden at square leg. A lazy hoick at another long hop ended Steve’s contribution at 43 of the first 58 but number three Richard Ward (47) then steered the ship within sight of victory before his brother and Paul Little finished the job off in style with nearly half of the last twenty still to be bowled.

Statistical Notes: Graham Davenport reached his one thousand runs for the Badgers, after a long wait induced by his shoulder problems. Darrell’s seven for ninety was his best ever return for the Badgers and his twenty-two overs the most by a Badger since Alan Tickner’s monster effort at Blindley Heath in 2004, and the third most since 1988 (when I started keeping full data – I’m afraid that there is no way I’m trawling back through the scorebooks for that one, even for my own progeny). There was also some discussion as to how long it was since the Badgers only used two bowlers for a whole innings, but that just goes to show how memory plays tricks because five of us were involved when Greggy and Mark bowled sixteen overs apiece whilst skittling the opposition for 42 in the rain at Stoke D'Abernnon in 2002. I am quite certain that there would be other instances back when Brian Moore regularly terrorised opponents but there are no other comparable cases in the last twenty-two seasons.

View the scorecard of this game

[It seems that nobody is interested in writing full match reports because they consider my summaries to be detailed enough to be sufficient, so this rather skeletal job is almost certainly going to have to suffice]

Summary: Another gloriously sunny day, with just enough breeze to keep the heat bearable, but not quite the same level of cricket as last week. The Badgers bowling early on was tight, with Allan Butt and first change Guy Walker being especially stingy, but the fielding became a little ragged as the heat of the day took its toll. In fact, after twenty-five overs the scoring rate was less than three an over but Leigh’s middle order provided just enough acceleration to post a formidable total despite Greggy (2-17) putting in an impressive spell as fifth change. Unfortunately our batting was woeful, with only Foxy, Pat and Mark making it into double figures and we never threatened the target before being bowled out with five of the last twenty overs still to be bowled.

Statistical Notes: Greggy made his 150th appearance in this game, and there are a few other significant milestones looming. Ian himself needs another six victims to reach 200 wickets for the club; Mark needs another 66 runs to pass Brian Moore into fourth place all time; and I need another 73 for 6000 (although at the current rate of progress that will take me all season and Mark will get there first – he is 165 behind me and thus needs 238 for 6000).

View the scorecard of this game

[It seems that nobody is interested in writing full match reports because they consider my summaries to be detailed enough to be sufficient, so this summary may well be all you get]

Summary: A gloriously sunny day, our longest-standing opponent, a lovely village cricket setting and as close a finish as you could wish for – yes, it was Dormansland time again. The Badgers largest crowd for some time – with the usual Gordon and Ward clans augmented by Dave Tickner & Jackie, Richard & Ann Kemp and Paula Gordon – were treated to an entertaining afternoon’s cricket that started with Allan and Graham Ward opening the bowling and keeping things fairly tight. Unfortunately a lack of detail in the scorebook makes it difficult to be precise about the shape of the home side’s innings, no running totals or fall of wickets were recorded after the first few overs, but only one of their batsmen failed to reach at least 30 and memory tells me that a slow acceleration was the order of the day. All of the Badgers bowlers came in for stick, with Darrell especially harshly treated by Nick Hellier (78 no.) despite numerous ‘swings and misses’, but Chris Byrne turned in another long spell for no reward, and his figures would have been very impressive if the skipper had taken him off one over earlier, at which point he’d conceded just 36 from 13 overs. Dormansland finally posted a tough target, having made 216 for 3 from 47 overs, but the highlight of their innings from our perspective was a diving catch by Allan Butt to provide Darrell with his only wicket.

The Badgers innings started steadily, with Ben opening the batting for the first time and slowly coming to terms with what was required. The last twenty started with 145 more runs still required, but all ten wickets intact. Ben fell for 23 in the first over of the last twenty and Mark departed for 52 two overs later, but Patrick and Graham Ward turned the game on its head. The run rate had reached almost ten an over, with 114 needed from 12, but they kept up with that rate for seven overs and when Graham (21) became the third victim for Stuart Hellier (who bowled unchanged from one end) Ian Gregg provided sufficient support for the Badgers hopes to remain high. The final over started with twelve required for an improbable victory but Pat was run out off the first ball and it was left to Greggy and Paul Wilson to be the heroes. They came so close to doing so, with Ian clumping a four from the penultimate ball but failing to repeat the feat off the last delivery, with the single taken leaving the visitors four runs shy of the win. However, it was a most enjoyable afternoon, with an exciting game of cricket played in the right spirit, and if every game was this much fun I for one would settle for a drawn game every week.

Statistical Notes: No major individual milestones this week, but for the anal-retentive amongst us, there was some discussion about what the result would have been if Greggy had hit a four from the final delivery to leave the total number of runs scored the same, and a little research confirms that the game would still be considered a draw. For it to be a tie the innings of the side batting last has to be completed, and thus in a timed game they have to lose all of their wickets. There have been three such ties in Badgers’ history, with all three occurring in just over a calendar year, and the first of those (against Stockwell Athletic on 2nd July 1977) looks dodgy by this definition – because the Badgers batted first and Stockwell only lost eight wickets – but a quick check of the scorebook shows that they only had nine men.

View the scorecard of this game

[A full match report might appear here in due course, although no one volunteered to document this debacle – probably for fear of posting something libellous about the umpiring]

Summary: After last year’s solid nine wicket win, the Badgers were given the chance to play on the main ground at Cheam Road, and made a lousy fist of it, both in the field and at bat. Fielding first, at the opposition’s request, the bowling was put to the sword from the get-go, with Greggy being a notable exception until an expensive last couple of overs spoilt his figures. Despite playing on one of the best outfields we will see all year, the fielding was fairly ragged all the way through the innings and the batsmen generally received full value for their shots. The first three change bowlers were all a little wild – Rako, Ben and Chris Turner all sent down a wide for their first delivery – and altogether we gifted Sutton 21 wides and 3 no balls (all for height). It was the fourth wicket partnership between Bosher (67) and Edwards (44) that did the most damage, taking the home side from 104 to 201 in just eighteen overs. Mark broke that pairing when returning to the attack in his leg-spinning guise and Chris Byrne eventually saw some reward from a tidy spell when Bosher assayed one excursion too many down the wicket and was stumped. Sutton closed their innings on 239 for 6 from 46 overs leaving the visitors a challenging target even on such a good wicket.

The reply got off to a quick-fire start, but the opening pair were soon back in the hutch, with Steve bowled off his pads after being lucky to survive the first over – the only ball that seriously misbehaved all day, leaping to shoulder height from just short of a length, having been poked to point who kindly spurned the chance – and Rako getting the first of two highly questionable leg before decisions, struck above the pads on his hip and given out after the home side appealed for a caught behind. The third wicket pair were pushing things along nicely, with Richard (41) continuing his form of the first week and Pat (19) looking especially comfortable, before their partnership was terminated at 44 when Pat was on the receiving end of the second dodgy LBW, attempting to sweep the young leg spinner Patel after taking a long stride down the wicket. Thereafter the scoring rate slowed from the initial six an over and the middle order seemed a little daunted by the size of the total being chased. Richard gave Patel (3-29) a third victim when he failed to clear deep mid off and this brought Foxy to the wicket to join Mark. They were just starting to push things along again, the last twenty having just started with 133 needed, when Foxy nicked one to the keeper leaving Mark in the not unfamiliar position of needing to shepherd the tail to an improbable victory. Not for the first time he made a decent fist of it, but support at the other end came and went too quickly and whilst a 37 run tenth wicket stand livened things up a little, the inevitable came when last man Chris Turner was bowled off various bits of his equipment leaving the skipper stranded on 47.

Statistical Notes: Rakesh joined the ranks of the ‘elite’ this week, with his overs in this game being enough to take him past the qualification level for the lifetime bowling averages. This event was celebrated in style at Rako Mansions after the game (although we didn’t know about it at the time!?) where we royally entertained and extremely well fed by the Dawar clan, and our thanks to them for their hospitality.

View the scorecard of this game

[A full match report might appear here in due course, although it might not since the assembled throng in the bar after the game decided that nobody else wanted to write one so it should fall to me, so this two paragraph summary may be all you get]

Summary: This game will probably be remembered more for the vagaries of the pitch than anything else, but there were several notable individual performances and it only tapered out to a tame draw in the final couple of overs. The Chairman and Greggy kept things tight early on, with Allan scooping up the top three – including a fine diving catch from Richard – but Ian remained as luckless as ever despite bending the ball around corners on occasion. The Broadbridge total was anchored by Daniel Smith (75), who became more assured and effective as the innings wore on, and made the visitors task that much more difficult by sharing a 56 run ninth wicket partnership with Nadeem (26). Guy Walker (3-38) did a tidy job, bowling the last nine and a half overs from one end, and eventually closing the innings by getting Smith to chip Mark his fourth catch of the innings, only one of which could have been classed as anything more than a dolly.

The Badgers innings got off to a shaky start, with Steve running out of gas taking a tight second run and Richard feathering one to the keeper (via his stumps, and thus correctly registered in the scorebook as bowled) but Wardy and Pat steadied the ship and gradually started to provide some impetus to the innings. The last twenty started with a requirement of nearly six an over and the visitor’s cause wasn’t helped by the departure of Graham for 40. Pat continued on his merry way, although there was some grumbling from both him and Mark about the home side’s somewhat overenthusiastic approach, with the bowlers being encouraged to inflict damage on the batsmen rather than the stumps. The halfway point of the twenty was reached with 82 still needed, but the pair started to up the pace and a famous win began to look like a possibility. Unfortunately Mark skied to deep mid off and the prospects of victory evaporated when a mix up with Guy, who poked a catch to the same fielder which was dropped, resulted in Pat being run out for what turned out to be 86. Guy and Allan kept the home side interested by continuing to go for the win until the final over started with 24 more required when they shut up shop and settled for the draw, which was a fair enough result.

Statistical Notes: My apologies to Graham Ward, but in trying to sort out a scorebook that didn’t add up, I recreated the whole innings over by over and discovered that he had been given one too many runs (and that Chris had been correct in announcing Pat’s fifty, even though there were only 49 runs recorded against him at that point, and thus Pat had scored 86 not 85). I also found a leg bye that had not been recorded against the fielding extras, but the other run appeared to have been conjured from thin air, so I have revised the final total down by one (although the opposition’s scorebook was even worse and their score could have been anything from the 193 that the batting totals added up to, through the 197 from totalling the bowling, to the 198 that they laid claim to via the running tally).

On a more positive note, the game was possibly my 400th for the club. The doubt arises mainly from the lack of a scorebook for the 1981 season, since I’ve been back over the pre-1988 scorebooks to confirm how many games I played in but did not get a bat, although there are also a handful of games during that period (and indeed earlier) where the full eleven is not known because only those that actually batted are recorded in the book. What can be said is that I’ve definitely now played at least 400 games for the club, with only Alan and Dave Tickner having recorded more (although Roy might also come close were I to spend the extra hours to dig through the 26 seasons for which the games played details for him are incomplete).

View the scorecard of this game

[A full match report should appear here in due course, especially since Pat made copious notes in the pub garden on Sunday evening, but for the time being this short summary will have to suffice]

Summary: A most beautiful sunny day – the sky became bluer and more cloudless as the day drew on – in a decidedly picturesque setting, was iced by a comfortable win for the Badgers in their season opener. The bowling was less rusty than the fielding with Greggy, as stingy as ever, helping to restrict the home side to just two an over during the first third of their innings. Opener Warner (44) slowly started to get on top of the bowling, until inexplicably attempting to pull a ball from Mark that wasn’t short enough, and thereafter only Hill (47) showed the necessary combination of patience and aggression to trouble the bowlers. Ben bowled a tidy spell, after overcoming early jitters, and eventually castled Hill when he attempted an uncharacteristic hoick across the line. Mark (4-37) had been plugging away at the other end and finally reaped some rewards for his hard work, but only after cutting his run up in half to avoid a drain cover that had been bugging him. Beechwood closed on 164 for 7 which was a decent enough effort but looked about twenty runs shy on a blameless pitch with a short boundary on one side.

The Badgers innings got off to two different starts, with Garnett keeping things tight at one end whilst his younger counterpart dished up too many loose balls at the other end. Steve (26) feasted on those offerings before being undone by the introduction of leg spinner Savory and it then fell to Graham Ward (28) to keep his brother Richard company. Both played sensibly and kept the scoreboard ticking along nicely, such that the last twenty overs started with 93 required and by the time Graham tamely chipped one back to the bowler the partnership had grown to 61 and the requirement was down to 64 from 14 overs. Graham’s dismissal brought Pat to the wicket and after a circumspect start (including a maiden over from the leggie where the first five balls were hit unerringly to a fielder, all along the ground of course, and the sixth looked like being a wide but revealed itself on pitching to be the googly) he and Richard accelerated towards the target. Richard was kicking himself for toe-ending a drive with victory just nine runs away and five overs still left to get them, but his 67 was instrumental in the Badgers successful chase and it did give Savory just reward for a decent thirteen over spell that could quite easily have brought him four or five wickets if only his fielders had been able to hang on to the chances created. Pat, who finished on 36 not out, then steered the ship to the necessary total with more than two overs to spare to cap a winning start to the season in a game that epitomised friendly cricket.

(You might also care to check out Beechwood’s page on the match which features a more comprehensive report along with scans of the scorebook pages)